Laddering

There aren’t that many caves in Buchan that you can walk into and out of, usually due to the fact they have vertical sections that cannot be ‘free climbed’ (IE Climbed with no aid). A vertical section of cave is called a pitch. Once you’ve done the 3 or 4 main caves that don’t have any pitches, you will have to graduate to the next level up, and use a ladder to ascend and descend the pitch in the cave.

Ladders – its all about technique

In Buchan specifically there are another half a dozen or so caves that have an ‘entrance pitch’. IE The start of the cave is straight down and cannot be free climbed. Once you are down the ladder to the bottom of the pitch the cave can then be explored horizontally. Some of these caves have further pitches further in, and some don’t.

Caving ladders are quite unique. They are made of metal and are flexible, so they can be coiled up when not in use to fit in a pack and transported. The advantage of being metallic is that they are tough and unlike rope which can be worn away or even severed, they are bomb proof in any situation.

A caver uses a wire caving ladder in the Armageddon Cave at Mt. Buffalo. Note the rungs are up against the rock, which makes getting your hands and feet in difficult.

Sounds good? There is a hitch. Because they are not solid, it means they have the tendancy to flail around if your technique is not good. The usual outcome is that the ladder swings out below you and you end up hanging on with just your arms. In that situation your arms will tire VERY quickly and you risk losing your grip.

To stop this happening the technique is to wrap your legs around the ladder so your heals go into the ladder from the other side. This equalises your centre of gravity and means you can use the strength in your legs to climb up or down. More often than not, as long as your not the final caver ascending, you can get people to hold the bottom of the ladder to stop it from flailing, which helps tremendously, but this can’t be guaranteed so you need to learn good laddering technique.

Your first laddering should be a practice in the outdoors – If in Buchan Wilson’s Cliff is an ideal place.

Ladders in the old days were used for all pitches, until single rope technique was developed. But they are still used today on pitches of less than about 10 metres. This is because for such a small pitch it is overkill to rig ropes and carry or wear vertical caving equipment.

All ladder climbs should be belayed. This means you will wear a harness connected to a rope at the top of the pitch, in case you slip and fall, get hit by a falling rock and lose consciousness, get too tired to keep holding on (which is almost always due to poor technique). If a harness is not available then one can be made using tape. Or as a worst case just tie a bowline knot around your body under your arms. A fall with just a rope around you will hurt (and potentially crack ribs) but it will stop you from falling.

The caver at the top of the pitch will use a ‘belay device’ to catch your fall if you come off the ladder. Such devices include stitch plates, racks, or even just a knot called a munter hitch tied around a carabiner (although this is not ideal as it twists the rope), but is a perfectly good makeshift belay if nothing else is available.

Never, Ever, do a ladder pitch without a belay on. Even if it is just a loop of rope around your waste!

On a short ladder of only perhaps 5 metres, often a belay is not used, but this is not good practice. Even a short fall of 5 metres can break bones or even kill you if you fall onto a sharp rock. So even on short ladder pitches a belay should ALWAYS be used.

The trip leader would normally operate the belay, and he or she should have a way to self belay when they descend the ladder after everyone else, or ascend the ladder before everyone else. Again, more often than not the leader has good technique and will just do the ladder with no belay, and that is their choice.

A well known local Victorian caver with 30 years of experience and an EXPERT on ladders was on a short pitch of only a few metres and the ladder which had become snagged on a rock suddenly shifted, with enough force to throw her off the ladder and she fell about 3 metres. Luckily she walked away, but it proves that it doesn’t matter how good you are – accidents can happen to anyone.

A good tool for short pitches.

Laddering is a real art form, and as I said, its all about your technique. They are good tools for short pitches and frequently used. Pitches more than 10 metres are more often done on ropes using SRT (Single Rope Technique) – see the other section under the advanced caving menu.